Therapy the Second- Body Image and Bulimia

Today was my second meeting with the psychotherapists. It wasn’t as traumatic as the first. I am quite tired today so this entry won’t be blazingly articulate.

The purpose of the meeting was to sort of set goals and focus. The focus is my problems with my body image and eating disorders. I’ve made a lot of progress as far as manic depression is concerned. I attend my appointments diligently, I take the medication and I acknowledge that I am in fact manic depressive. I don’t run away from it, I’ve stopped denying it.

But in two years I have made no progress whatsoever in terms of my body image problems and bulimia. Unlike manic depression, it can’t be medicated into submission. My moods are somewhat artificial, just held in place with a sticking plaster. If I ditched all my medications now, my mental health would disintegrate rapidly, as it always does. I am aware that I am constantly treading a delicate tightrope.

But there are days without depressions and manias, days of mood-alrightness. But every day I am rebuking the shape in the mirror. Every day I am throwing up most of what I eat.

My confidence is shattered and it has seeped into every area of my life. I have no confidence in any part of myself. It’s not just my appearance. It’s everything. I’d have written at least a page of a novel right now if I had the confidence to do so. I read books and think, I will never be that good, so why bother. Who would want to read anything I write? And so on. So I am in stasis because I am too afraid to do anything, petrified of being exposed as untalented, of being told I am “one of those” who isn’t good enough and who shouldn’t even bother.

It struck me as I left the centre that I speak so easily about manic depression. It has been so destructive and continues to be, but I can laugh and joke and serve up wide, toothy grins when talking about it.

But with my body issues, I do not laugh and joke. I practically spit out the words through gritted teeth. There are no funny stories. Just endless tales of smashing hand mirrors against walls, of not being able to watch most films because I can’t bear to see how beautiful everyone else is, of finding it difficult to socialise because I am ugly and trollish and dull compared to my friends. It is an entirely dark, shapeless and depressing state. I kept apologising for my vanity. It is vanity. I told them how shallow and trivial I felt, because I don’t judge people by how they look, yet I judge myself on it. There is, and always will be, an association between beauty and goodness. The evil witch is ugly while our heroine is beautiful. Only the deaths of the young and beautiful are mourned in newspapers.

They asked me if I had ever tried to help myself. I said yes, that I had signed up to eating disorder forums and body dysmorphic disorder forums so that I could garner some support and try to understand what was happening to me. I’ve lasted about a day in both. The eating disorder forum locked my thread because it was a “medical question”, not exactly a warm welcome, and disheartening because I’d been reading for ages and hadn’t the guts to post before. And on a BDD forum, I logged out and never logged back in again when I viewed their photo thread. Everyone there was so beautiful. I felt like I didn’t even fit in amongst the people who saw themselves as monsters. I know that’s bizarre thinking- traditionally BDD has nothing to do with actual physical attractiveness, it is perceived ugliness. But I read those posts and think that I am the exception. I am truly ugly, not just someone who imagines that they are.

They asked if I liked anything about myself, physically. The honest answer is no. I told them I don’t accept compliments and people don’t bother giving me them anymore. I dismiss them, yet I will gather and stow away every single negative comment about my appearance. I can remember them all.

I also told them that I take hundreds of photos of myself. Here is vanity, again. I do, but I hate, loathe, despise, panic over people taking my photo. A few exist that I have allowed to, but I have gotten myself into fights with friends when they’ve posted photos they took of me online. I’ve eased off- I just try not to look at them- but I find it so upsetting. I feel as though I have been exposed.

They asked if I weigh myself. I do, many times a day. What if you couldn’t weigh yourself? I become anxious and distracted. At Rob’s house, if I eat, I think all the time of what I weigh now. I itch to get home to the bathroom. It’s counterproductive, I know. If you eat, you’ll immediately gain weight because there’s something in your stomach. I see the number, I freak out, I throw up the food so the number returns to what it was in the morning.

I weigh 8st 13lbs. I weighed over 12st in January. The “ideal” weight for me ranges from 6st 6lbs to 8st 11lbs. Six stone! How will I ever achieve that? I think my broad bones alone would weigh that. So I am two pounds overweight, and even then it’s at the very, very end of my ideal weight range. It is inarguable that I need to lose weight. My fatness is not body dysmorphia, it’s a fact.

What kind of goals do I want to achieve?

I want to eat normally. But I still want to lose weight, so I am stuck there. The damage I am doing to my teeth is really upsetting me. I don’t want to throw up or use laxatives anymore. I want to be able to go for dinner with Rob or my friends without being preoccupied how and where I am going to throw up.

I want to go outside without feeling paranoid that I’m being looked at. I want to strut down a street thinking I’m beautiful without looking behind me or to the side once.

I want to stop comparing myself to every body else. I want to be able to be with my friends without wanting to run away because I feel so hideous. I want to break my addiction to stupid celebrity sites where I compare myself to them.

I want to accept a compliment. I want to believe a compliment.

I want to stop picking at my face and body. I want to look at my face and think, “It’s fine. It’s okay”.

I want to be able to leave my house without panicking and changing my clothes and make up a few times. I want to spend less time freaking out about my appearance.

I want to go one day without snarling about how fat and ugly I am.

I want to go one day without throwing up or using laxatives.

I want to be able to go shopping without being almost reduced to tears at the full length mirrors and other, beautiful shoppers.

I want Rob to stop worrying that I am going to die because of it all.

I want a lot of things. I don’t know how much is achievable. There is only five sessions, then an evaluation, then possibly five more sessions. How am I going to disentangle myself from a lifetime’s worth of habit and hate in five weeks?

The whole thing is just ridiculous to me. I’m a sensible person, straightforward, I have my (mental) head screwed on. I am constantly angry at myself that this trips me up. It seems so stupid and so easily conquered, how hard is it to think, “Fuck it, I look fine, let’s go” or “I’ll eat this and it will be nice”? It all feels like vapid vanity to me, and I loathe that in myself.  I’m also aware that I’m not that bad.  In my mind, not that bad means not worth fixing.  I know it’s an odd way of thinking, but it’s the reasoning behind a lot of things to me, for example, staunchly refusing to go a doctor for years.  I was that bad, in terms of extreme moods, but I couldn’t see it.  It’s only with hindsight that I realised it.